March 21st shall go down as the Academy Awards of Pizza for us. To celebrate such an occasion we decided to strut our stuff. Behold!
As you see this was no mere pizza outing. This, dear friend, was The Buffalo Pizza Bash! Keith Wilson hosted 20 local pizzerias to show off their goods in hopes that they could walk away with an award for best dough, sauce, cheese, NY style pizza etc. Gentlemen, start your EATING!
Walking into Samuels Grand Manor, you could see the entire place was transformed into a large pizzeria with all the vendors strategically placed around eating areas. There were many spectacles abound to say the least. Characters, mascots, contests, performers and performances very amusing, very amusing indeed. Tickets were purchased at a central vending location and then they were traded in for wonderful slices of pizza! Portions of the proceeds went to benefit Kids Escaping Drugs. What those kids need is pizza instead of drugs!
Being that this is a pizza bash it would be logical to assume that each pizzeria was bringing their A game. In the hopes that they would, we are basing our reviews this week off of each slice we had from the vendors we tried. We could not eat all 20 but we managed to eat through 11. So here we go.
Eatza my pizza: We both ate a slice of this and the consensus was that there was not enough sauce at all. Shrew liked the crust the best, it was crunchy and flaky. It reminded me of pizza that sat around for a day that had been re-heated. I didn’t appreciate the crust at all. If the crust must be crunchy then it should have some fluff inside and there was none on this. The cheese was good and so was the pepperoni. I elected to have sautéed mushrooms on my slice and that was a nice touch. Overall it wasn’t bad and surely wasn’t the worst of the day. We would go along for the ride.
Mister Pizza (Niagara Falls Blvd): Certainly not the Elmwood one. It was similar but not as good. Sauce was great and there was a good amount. The cheese and toppings were tasty. It was a good example of what a pizza should be however was not by any means outstanding. Go along for the ride.
Deliberations continue...
Giangels: Holy Fuck this was awesome! Not only are we going to give this a will go out of our way to have it……We will go out of our way to have it again. This was amazing. There was simply not one bad thing to be said about this pizza as it sat there at the show. Crust, dough, sauce, cheese, pepperoni all made with a slice of heaven!!! This was hands down the best tasting and most flavorful pizza we had at this event and I have personally had in a long time. Would go out of our way and you should too.
Gianni Mazias: A good tasting slice, sort of common place. The slice was thin, dough was tasty, the sauce was tasty, the cheese was adequate and pepperoni was good. For being a thinner slice it was a little wiggly and that’s a no-no in Shrews book. Based on everything else we were having it was a Go along for the ride. On a side note I went here for lunch a few days after the event, they have one of the nicest atmospheres for a pizza place I have ever seen. Well done, gentlemen. We will probably make another trip out to see how it is for dinner.
Gr8 Pizza: Not that great. When you make claims like this in your name you create big expectations in that of your customer. They had some sort of wild Italian pizza that we were eying up along with their cannoli pizza but once we had the pepperoni we were turned off by it completely. First impressions are a bitch! We struggled to find something good about the slice and resolved that we just were not able to. I can’t pick it apart, all I can say is that the overall taste was not desirable, and I think that says it all. Maybe it’s the Kenmore curse. If you are thinking of opening a pizza place in Kenmore either don’t or make sure your pizza is the best in a 5 mile radius. Probably would not go back or recommend.
Johns Pizza & Subs: OMG DO NOT WANT. Nothing about this pizza was good at all. I mean it looked good but man were looks deceiving. The dough sucked, the cheese was undercooked as you could see individual strands and the pepperoni was forgettable. The sauce reminded us of a crappy pasta sauce more than a pizza sauce. The ass end of the pizza left much to be desired as it too was very fluffy, not what a crust should be. That was the worst of the day for sure. I used to like this when I was a kid. I was a stupid kid. Meh, at least they had bleu cheese.
That shirt should say “Creepster.”
John & Mary’s: Wasn’t that good at all. Everything was bland. Honestly I’m not sure why anyone would pay for this pizza. It’s like the kind of cold pizza you get when you are at a school or church function because some asshole in the head office thinks it’s great like everything else in their pathetic life. Like everything else from John & Mary’s, this sucks and is unimpressive. How have they been in business for this many years? What does that say for the tastes of the area? I’m not sure. Would not go back or recommend.
In between places we were approached by Shrew's brother, Newman, and some of our friends. Newman stated, “I walked in and thought, that guy looks like my brother in a top hat….THAT IS MY BROTHER IN A TOP HAT!!!” Priceless.
Governor Walker and Citizen Shrew
Johnny LaBellas: It’s not fair of us to include them in this. We did eat their pizza. However it was a loaded pizza. So I won’t say too much about it. It was good considering neither of us are fans of loaded pizzas, or olives for that matter. I know they wanted feedback but maybe some other time, sorry guys. Christine, our photographer and my girlfriend, liked it a lot as she can only eat the toppings and cheese seeing as she is gluten intolerant. Anything more than 3 ingredients on a pizza are too much in my opinion.
At this point we were starting to feel the grease and carbs hitting us like tranquilizer darts. Moving forward, we trudged on.
Russell's Gourmet Pizzas: It was shame that this guy only does catering because his pizza was pretty good and I have a feeling that if he had an establishment it would probably be pretty snazzy. They choose to cook their pizza on a BBQ grill. I like, different. The dough burned and carburized in all the right spots giving this pizza an interesting flavor. The sauce was really sweet and thick which was a nice change. The toppings were your standard cheese and pep but both were good and in ample supply. The crust was unique, which isn’t surprising since this is such a different method to cooking pizza. If he were open we would go out of our way for sure.
Sal’s Famous Pizzeria: Sal’s is a NY style pizza but since it’s here in Buffalo it gets tasted and reviewed. It was pretty good for NY style for sure. The only real complaint is the type of pepperoni that they used. Compared to other types of NY style pizzas we have had, it was a little bland. Not a big fan of very flat margarita pepperoni that is so prevalent in NY style pizza. Other than that it was pretty good, we would go along for the ride. However if you live in Kenmore, this is probably the place to go.
Ok, any more pizza and we were going to burst. We decided to take a walk out back get some air and hopefully move some of this mass through our intestines so we could continue being the gluttons that we are.
Back at it…..
Papa Leo’s: This was the last and final place for the day otherwise we were going to die. The seasonings they used added a nice flavor but otherwise nothing really jumped out at us. I did notice that the cheese was kind of undercooked. Nothing much can be said about this pizza. It wasn’t horrible but it wasn’t great. We’d go along for the ride, maybe.
Other than the Pizza Hangovers this was a great event for a great cause. And thus we come to the end of another pizza concluding this week’s episode of Masterpiece Pizza Club. Until next time!
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